


What Lay Waiting

by InFormalMajesty



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dreams and Nightmares, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Ghosts, Hurt/Comfort, Inception Vibes, Jedi Rey, Jedi Temple, Mortis (Star Wars), Please Dear Lord Somebody Hug Ben Solo, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Psychological Horror, Psychological Torture, Seriously just an excuse to write soft Ben Solo, Soft Ben Solo, Soft Kylo Ren, Somebody Hug Ben Solo, Star Wars: The Last Jedi Spoilers, there is a lot of crying
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-04
Updated: 2018-02-04
Packaged: 2019-02-28 09:02:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13268148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InFormalMajesty/pseuds/InFormalMajesty
Summary: After the destruction of The Supremacy, Ben Solo is left in a coma and The First Order is crumbling. However, remnants of the past threaten to destroy The New Republic and The Jedi’s attempt at restoring democracy and order. As rumors spread that another dark side insurgence is upon them, Rey is plagued by threats against Ben’s life that only she can hear. In an attempt to save him, Rey digs deeper into Ben’s memories and discovers that Ben is not alone in his unconscious mind.





	1. Hope

 

The fire raged in flashes of blazing light, the flames crawling their way across the throne room like a wounded soldier looking for refuge. The smoke danced around them and cloaked the throne room in a veil of darkness. Through this growing fury of smoke and flame, Rey could see the glint of Anakin’s broken kyber crystal. With blurry vision, Rey pushed herself on to her hands and knees. Looking around, she realized that she must have only been out for a few moments as the once foreboding red room had not yet fallen prey to fire and ash. Rey quickly pushed her body closer to the two pieces of broken alloy and took the saber into her hands.

 

Rey propped herself on her knees and stared at the lightsaber in her palms. Her body felt unusually heavy as if weighed down by pounds of steel. It was an odd feeling, especially since Rey could feel the strength in her limbs, could feel how effortlessly she could push and pull herself up if she wanted to. This was a weight she was unfamiliar with, yet a weight that she had felt before when her hands were much smaller and her smile much less frail, somewhere in the graveyard of a desert wasteland.

 

The little girl from Jakku screamed at her to move, to save herself, to fight. But she ignored her. For the first time in her life, Rey was pinned to the floor by a crushing sense of defeat so strong she felt as if she may dissipate into the floor. She wanted desperately to release the emotion. She needed to put it somewhere, anywhere, but no tears stained her cheeks. There was nothing but an emptiness so cold and bitter the heat of the flames nipping at her flesh may as well have been the ruthless wind of a winter storm. 

 

She drew in a deep breath to steady her heart. The rush of thick smoke filling her lungs made her gag and the throne room was filled with cacophonous coughing sounds.

 

Nothing really seemed palpable to comprehend. She was caught in a daze of hidden memories telling her of the lies she had tried so hard to suppress. She watched the vision of her parents pushing her into Unkar Plutt’s greasy hands, turning their backs on her and flying away without a word. The memory replayed like a holo on a loop, repeating the same message again and again with no end or meaning or clarity. 

 

_ They left me to die. _

 

It was a thought that had lingered for so long; a concept locked away in the fissures of her brain, buried deep. So deep, in fact, that everytime she added another mark on her AT-AT’s wall counting down the days until she would have a family, the thought never crossed her consciousness. Like a demon in the underworld, it lay; a dead soul with no way out. 

 

But it had gotten out. 

 

And it was his fault. 

 

_ Ben.  _

 

Her eyes immediately snapped to the other side of the burning room. Through the smoke she could see the outline of him lying on his side. He was turned away from her, his black hair thrown across his face, unmoving. 

 

The energy that compelled her to move towards him was not instinct. No, the little girl from Jakku would not have approved of this, meandering through a deathly curtain of darkening smoke to be near something that had often proven itself to be even more deathly and dark. It was not instinct that caused her body to collapse in front of him. It was not instinct that caused her hands to brush across his cheek, his bloody, mangled hair, his sweaty, gloved hand. And it was not instinct that allowed her voice to call his name, the syllable falling from her mouth in a shaken, desperate plea as she shook his shoulder almost violently. 

 

When the man did not move, Rey checked his pulse with two shaky fingers. Relief--as possibly irrational as it was--flooded through her when she could feel the feint drum of his vein against her fingertips. 

 

A support beam on the opposite side of the throne room hit the sturdy floor with a resounding thud that startled the scavenger. She was losing time. She looked back to Ben’s face, calm in sleep. The tears Rey had searched desperately for a moment ago began to fall as she contemplated leaving him. How could she feel compassion for him after he asked her to watch her friends die? She knew the answer, of course. It was difficult, knowing his mind, to believe his intentions were truly cruel. She had seen his loneliness and his hatred; his bitterness and, yes, his compassion. And Rey--although so ready to grab her lightsaber and walk away from him--couldn’t look at his face, morphed into a visage of desperacity and hope, as he begged her to join him, and think that Ben Solo was entirely dead. 

 

The crippling burning in her chest was growing stronger. She was torn. She was upset with him and felt almost betrayed, yet she knew she couldn’t leave him there to die. When she felt as if she might choke from all of the emotion and pain happening all too quickly at once, the elevator door hissed open. 

 

Rey’s brown eyes wet from tears darted up to meet the indignant blue stare of General Armitage Hux. 

 

His brow furrowed. Hux did not expect to come face to face with the scavenger he had seen only once before on Starkiller. His gaze then flew to what Rey held between her hands. 

 

He was initially exhilarated by the sight of his feeble minded foe lying lifeless on the throne room floor. But his glee was short lived when he saw the way the scavenger held him with trembling hands and tear-stained eyes, one hand gently draped across his neck, while the other cradled his cheek. 

 

Alarm coursed through Hux as he turned from the two force sensitives to survey the rest of the room. The damage done here was not the result of the violent attack against The Supremacy. The destruction took place before. He saw the praetorian guards through the smoke, their mangled bodies strewn across the floor. He saw the glint of Kylo Ren’s crossguard plunged into the side of one of the fallen soldiers. And, most importantly,  he saw the severed form of his Supreme Leader lazily lying in pieces around the throne.

 

Anger twisted Hux’s features into a mask of pain and wrath. He clutched his gloved fists tightly and his face became hot and red.

 

As quickly as the furor had spread across his face, however, it subsided and Hux released it all in a maniacal cackle that seemed to transport his intense anger into wicked delirium. 

 

“I should have known,” Hux chuckled with a mad smirk, his eyes wide and almost wild. Rey released her hands from Ben’s face, the little girl from Jakku finally taking over Rey’s senses. Hux turned to her and without a moment of thought ran towards Rey and grabbed her throat with one of his hands. He squeezed, attempting to take from Rey’s lungs the air that the smoke had not already claimed. 

 

Rey flung her palm against Hux’s chest and propelled him backwards with the force. His head smashed against the opposite wall of the throne room. While Hux gripped his head in pain and while his eyes showed that he registered some kind of ache in the back of his skull, Hux continued to laugh.

 

“I knew I shouldn’t have let him lead  _ you  _ up here  _ alone _ ,” Hux spoke through small, breathy chortles. “The Supreme Leader told me I was crazy.  _ Me _ ?” 

 

Hux’s tone suddenly got very serious, the laughter dwindling as quickly as it had started. His tone was cold and cruel. “The Supreme Leader didn’t see the way  _ he  _ looked at you that last day on Starkiller. The Supreme Leader didn’t see the way he held your body to his.  _ Kylo Ren _ .” Hux’s voice rose in volume with every sentence. He dropped his hand from his head to his stomach as if he was gripping a wound that pained him.

 

“I’ve seen him blindly order armies to murder galaxies and yet none of us were even allowed to lay a finger on you. And when he was defeated in the forest...I knew. He could have ripped you apart. But he didn’t.  _ I knew _ ! I always knew! How weak and foolish he was, tricked by the doe eyes of a silly girl!” Hux reached the hand that was resting on his stomach quickly into his jacket, pulling out his blaster and aiming it at Rey’s head. 

 

Rey dove across the throne room floor. The blast flew through the ever darkening, thick clouds of smoke and hit the wall. With little time to react, Rey’s head flew up, scanning anywhere for a weapon. She registered the faint outline of the thick red wire that was attached to the hilt of Ben’s crossguard. Without wasting a second, Rey called the lightsaber to her and sent the scarlet blade shrieking to life. She spun the blade around just in time to reflect Hux’s second shot in her direction. The blaster shot ricocheted from the erratic beam of the red blade and sent the blast flying back in his direction, hitting Hux on the side of his left thigh. 

 

Hux let out a cry of pain and he cursed as he put pressure on the blaster wound with both of his hands. He looked up to her with a raging snarl that lasted only as long as it took Rey to thrust the blaster towards Hux’s head with the force and knock him unconscious against the throne room wall.

 

Rey heaved in and out. The little girl from Jakku grinned, feeling the fury and the adrenaline course through her like a wild animal. Another loud crack of the ship’s support beam falling just past the throne brought her back to the moment. 

 

She tucked Ben’s crossguard into her belt and turned her attention back to Ben. She checked again if he was still breathing. When she could still feel his pulse below her fingertips, she dug out her comlink from the folds of her outfit. 

 

A slight sense of relief rushed through her again when she realized the choice to leave or take Ben Solo had been made for her. She couldn’t get herself to kill Hux. Plus, for all she knew, he could be of use to the Resistance. She wasn’t going to leave Ben to be slaughtered for the acts they had committed together, as a unit, as a team. 

 

“Chewie!” Rey shouted into the comlink when she could hear Chewbacca’s anxious roar on the other end of the connection. 

 

“Chewie, I’m fine. Listen to me. I need your help.” She glanced down at Ben and his hulking form. She was strong but there was no way she could drag him to the Falcon without him likely getting severely injured. 

 

“R2 knows where to find me,” she explained, touching the binary beacon on her arm. “How close can you safely get to me?” Rey’s voice was shaky. She jumped as another support for the ship broke off and disappeared into the smokey abyss with a keen bang. 

 

Chewie paused. Rey could hear R2’s beeps somewhere in the background. Chewie roared into the comlink, indicating a location.

 

The east hangar bay…

 

It was right outside of the elevator. She would be able to drag Ben that far…

 

“Come to me. I need you to help me take somebody aboard.” 

 

Rey closed the comlink. She picked up the two halves of her broken lightsaber that lay beside Ben and secured them tightly on the inside of her belt next to Ben’s crossguard. 

 

She turned her attention to Ben’s body and put each of her hands around his ankles. She took as deep a breath as she could manage, coughing up smoke as she did so, and began to haul Ben’s rather massive body towards the elevator.

 

“Kriff, Ben” she huffed through coughs as inch by inch she maneuvered his too-large shape across the floor.

 

Somewhat out of breath and shaking from remaining adrenaline and anxiety, Rey punched the elevator button. Calm washed over her. They were going to be okay...they would make it out of here alive…

 

She shifted Ben into the elevator alongside her. Releasing Ben’s ankles, she gazed at his sleeping, bloody face. She could feel the pain well up in her chest at the image and the worry that began to course through her that maybe he wouldn’t wake up...but she didn’t have time to contemplate that right now. With trembling fingers, Rey grabbed the comlink as the elevator doors shot open. 

 

“Chewie!” Rey yelled into the device. She was once again greeted by Chewie’s anxious roar. 

 

“Chewie are you in the hangar bay?” When she got an affirmative answer, she continued. “I need you to come to the elevator on the far side of the hangar? Do you see it?” Chewie gave another affirmative roar, his reply touched with a tinge of annoyance.

 

She knew she was asking him to risk his life and she had no idea what Ben and Chewie’s relationship was like. Although, whatever kind of relationship it was once upon a time, it was likely blown to pieces by Ben murdering his best friend.

 

Rey could see Chewie’s gigantic furry form running through the burning hangar. The hangar itself looked like a war zone. Tie fighters were burning down to the frame and corpses lay strewn across the melting steel floor. 

  
Rey looked back to Chewie whose face had grown uneasy as he recognized the body lying behind Rey. 

 

It was not exactly anger that tinged his features, but a growing apprehension and conflict that seemed to plague the wookiee’s mind instead. 

 

Rey touched his arm. “Please,” she whispered. This plea was all she could offer. She had no other option. “I know you don’t owe this to me. But please...do it for Han.”

 

Rey had no right to play that card, she knew it. But as the ship caved down around them, she had no time to reason with Chewbacca. 

 

The wookiee didn’t utter a sound as he lifted the comatose body of his best friend’s son into his large arms. Rey closed her eyes for a moment and felt a deep sigh flow through her as a small weight was lifted from her shoulders. Chewie turned, traveling as fast as he could with the weight of Ben Solo in his arms across the burning chasm of the massive First Order vessel.

 

***

 

Chewbacca did not speak to Rey after they had boarded the Falcon. He gently placed Ben’s body on a long soft cushion against the wall that acted as some kind of makeshift bed. He did not make a sound when Rey thanked him and placed a hand on his arm. He piloted the Falcon in silence as it drifted towards Crait.   

 

Rey knelt beside Ben. The swell of emotion she had been forced to push out as she rescued him from the crashing ship had returned. It was not as strong as it was, but she knew she would have to deal with it eventually. For now, however, it was temporarily subsided by a growing anxiety inside Rey at the thought that she would soon have to explain to the remaining Resistance why she had saved a war criminal. This wasn’t her plan...at least she didn’t think it was. She felt betrayed by the overwhelming comfort blooming in the center of her chest that Hux had given her a good reason to take Ben Solo with her. 

 

It was silly; a foolish girl’s hope for a man she felt she had given too much to already. The little girl from Jakku hung her head low in anguish again. She was furious and disappointed. She had felt abandoned ever since their hands had touched on Ahch-To and the hope began to seed that maybe if she could turn this conflicted soul, maybe she wouldn’t have to be alone. And here and now, she felt tossed aside and forgotten once again as Rey lifted her hand to brush the side of Ben Solo’s gentle, sleeping face. 

 

No, she could not see darkness here, not now. She ghosted her fingers around Ben’s dark lavender lids, an indication of how much sleep he had been missing. She traced the path of the scar she had given him from above his brow to the base of his throat. She had an urge to trace the outline of his soft, pink lips; lips she thought about more than she wanted to admit. 

 

She remembered what she had thought of in the elevator, when she had approached him. He looked so surprised when she walked towards him as if he didn’t find himself approachable or worthy of somebody’s attention. She could see his expressive, brown eyes--constantly tinged with some amount of sadness reaching through the years--flickering between her gaze and her lips. She imagined in that moment pressing her bound hands on to his broad chest and rocking up on her toes to meet her lips with his. Would he have kissed her back? Would he have encircled one of his arms around the small of her back, pulling her closer to his chest? Would he have lifted a palm to her cheek, threading his large fingers through the strands of her chestnut hair? 

 

_ “The Supreme Leader didn’t see the way he looked at you that last day on Starkiller.” _

 

Hux’s words echoed in Rey’s mind as she wandered through her daydream. Her hands had gravitated to Ben’s long, black curls. She dragged her fingertips through the ends, playing with the corners of his hair. She held onto the irrational hope that maybe he would wake up and look at her with those soft eyes he had in the elevator or even perhaps with those eyes that had gazed at her across galaxies when their hands touched skin to skin. They were those eyes that had looked upon her with a mix of fear and understanding and  _ hope _ that transcended the stars and time itself. 

 

_ “Son of Darkness,”  _ Snoke had said. 

  
She should take his words more to heart. She shouldn’t be blindly hoping for a future that was shattered with a proposal to murder her friends and rule the galaxy like tyrants, like gods. But she saw him when they touched hands. Although not entirely clear, she had seen him looking down at her, her fingers brushing against the sides of his cheek, his hand curling around hers in return, and a brilliant smile stretched across his face. The area around them was green, like a garden she had heard about in stories from junkers passing through Jakku. There were vines that held flowers of blues and reds and light pinks weaving their way across a labyrinth of small jade colored leaves. 

 

No, Rey could not see that darkness. And in this brief moment of brilliant blindness, she kept hope.

 

From the front of the Falcon, R2 began beeping frantically and Chewie descended into Crait’s atmosphere. 

  
  
  



	2. The Ghosts You Won't Allow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leia reunites with her son; The New Republic rallies for Kylo Ren's execution; Rey reconnects with Ben through the force bond.

Leia Organa’s unsteady hands clutched her son’s fingers tightly as if at any moment something would force them apart. A single tear rolled down her cheek and fell onto the heavy black fabric affixed to Ben’s chest. No sound escaped her throat and to any onlookers the former princess would have appeared stoic, detached. Inside, however, the general was overwhelmed.

It had been over a decade since she had seen her son. She remembered the emotions in his eyes when he had departed. She remembered the fear, the anger, the uncertainty, the flash of hope. But most of all, Leia remembered the sadness. There was always that sadness resting in the depths of his brown eyes...her eyes.

His face was constantly expressive, yet she never knew if he was truly showing her how he felt. It’s how he kept the truth tucked inside that head of his. The truth that he was never truly alone, that there was always a monster in the dark playing with his mind, tampering with this emotions...

Leia didn’t want to think about Snoke right now. Rey told him he was dead, that Ben himself had been the one to kill him. She would take that as a sign of hope. Although, every part of her knew that Ben may not wake up the same man that had found the strength to cast out the monster in his mind.

How could she think any differently? She had felt him in that moment when she and her team were blown into the flames because of a shot that she did not want to believe her son had fired. She felt the conflict. But it was the same conflict she had felt when she knew he had killed her husband. She knew her son had taken him from her and yet she could sense the unspoken apology, the unspoken crushing regret. It happened quickly; a fleeting whisper in the force. And then it was gone and the anger returned to him as if it had never left.

Leia took a deep breath. As she inhaled, she felt a jolt through the force as familiar as the breath she took through her lungs.

“Luke,” she whispered aloud.

She could sense his sorrow at first. Then... intrigue as if he could sense the man whose hands she held.

“He’s here, Luke” Leia breathed, another tear touching the corner of her eye and skimming the side of her cheek.

Several emotions flooded through her at once across the force,a mix of melancholy and concern; longing and relief.   
  
“Come home Luke. Please.” She could feel his presence for only a moment longer and then it was gone. A void remained in her chest that she tried not to linger upon. She should feel happy and accomplished. Lacking any leadership, the First Order was collapsing, the Resistance could begin to restore freedom throughout the galaxy, and her son--if for the moment--was home.

Leia sensed somebody behind her. Their energy was tentative, indefinite.

“Rey, come.” Leia spoke without turning around.

She heard quiet footsteps behind her as Rey approached Leia and knelt beside her on the Falcon’s floor.

They sat in silence for a few moments. Leia wanted so badly to ask why she seemed so concerned about him. She wanted to know what had happened between her and her son to make her care enough to save him, but she felt like now may not be the best time to broach the subject. Rey looked exhausted and surely she must feel uneasy after telling her friends how she had saved a war criminal. They were not happy about a former leader of the First Order being aboard their vessel...

“Thank you,” Leia simply spoke, placing the hand that was not still gripping Ben’s fingers on top of Rey’s.

Rey gave her a small smile that made an effort to hide her fatigue and emotion.

“I know he didn’t make the decision to do what he did on his own. So whatever you did...thank you.”

Rey nodded and opened her mouth to speak.

“We...I can’t quite explain it,” Rey began. “We could...hear each other... _see_ each other...feel...even from a great distance I--”

Rey looked up to see Leia’s wide eyes.

“You’re bonded with my son?”

Before Rey could answer a broad smile grew across Leia’s face. The general broke out into an unexpected chuckle that almost made Rey jump.

“My son? Forced into places with a pretty, spitfire girl like you? I really wish Han was around to hear this one…” her voice trailed off, Leia’s eyes clouding over with a tinge of sadness.

Rey grimaced, remembering when the force had transported her unexpectedly into his bedroom while he stood there, freshly showered, with no shirt. But she wasn’t about to bring _that_ up now…

“Do you think he’ll be okay?” Leia asked then.

“I hope,” was the only response she could muster.

 

***

 

“Okay, here’s the plan. When we land on Naboo, Finn, you distract Rey. Rose, you distract Leia. And Chewie and I will throw that fucking war criminal into the nearest large body of water.”

Poe was pacing frantically and talking with his hands in the front of the Falcon.  

“What if that just wakes him up?” Finn challenged, following Poe’s steps as they both maneuvered madly back and forth, back and forth.

“Well can he swim?”   
  
“That’s a great point, maybe he’ll just drown.”

Can you drown with the force?”

Rose--who was sitting on the couch, her feet perched over a game of dejarik--was getting dizzy.

“You guys cannot be serious?”

Both of them stopped pacing at the same time to look at Rose.

“YES!” They both shouted at once before going back to their frenzied strides.

Rose took a deep breath and removed her legs from the table.

“Look. I’m not happy he’s here either. But he’s here. And for whatever reason, Rey seems confident that he won’t do anything--”

“Violent?!” Finn yelled as loud as he could without his voice traveling too far down the Falcon.

“Repulsive!?” Poe exclaimed at the same time.

“He slashed my back! He killed Han Solo!” Finn called.  

“Yeah...he almost killed Finn! He _did_ kill my jacket!” Poe added.

“I worked under him for years. I _know_ what he’s capable of.” Finn had walked over to the table and placed his palms flat against the surface, leaning towards Rose.

Rose shook her head. “All I heard you talk about was Rey. Why won’t you trust your friend?”

Finn was taken aback.

“Rose, I’m not saying I don’t trust Rey--”

“Then why don’t you believe her? You really think she would bring somebody here who was going to kill all of us? I don’t know her. I have no reason to trust her. But Finn, I know you. I do trust you. And I know you trust her. That’s enough for me.”

Finn had no words. He wanted to fight her, to tell her she was wrong. Kylo Ren was dangerous. But he couldn’t find any words that made sense.

Rose seized the moment of his silence.

“What if people thought that about you when you were with the First Order? What if people saw you as nothing but dangerous? You changed Finn. Poe didn’t have to believe you. He did.”

Poe shook his head.

“That was different…” Poe trailed off, scratching the back of his head.

Finn continued his silence, his hands still firmly pressed on the top of the round table.

“I’m not okay with this,” Poe reiterated.

“Fine,” Rose spoke, crossing her arms across her chest. “Maybe he’s a threat. But right now, he’s unconscious and can’t cause anybody harm anyway. So at least let Leia have time with her son while she can.”

Poe’s slow intake of breath was the only sound that could be heard.

Finn made no attempt to argue.

 

***

 

The atmosphere was tense when The Resistance landed on Naboo.

Leia was hesitant about arriving unannounced at her mother’s home planet. Not only was she carrying a wanted criminal but Naboo was not in the best state politically at the moment.

After the destruction of Hosnian Prime, Naboo’s Senator, Thadle Berenko, had been killed along with most of the politicians leading the New Republic. Thadle’s sister, Raina, had quickly been elected in as Thadle’s replacement, however, the grief of Thadle’s loss lingered.

Chewie--who had been silent during the trip--expressed his concern. Leia touched his shoulder as the Falcon coaxed into Theed’s spacious palace hangar bay.

“It’s alright, Chewie. This may not be the best option, but I know Raina well.”

Leia smiled. Raina and Thadle had stayed friendly with Leia even after the truth about her real parentage had been broadcasted all over the Senate.

Chewie looked at Leia incredulously and tipped his head behind him. His eyes flickered to the back of the Falcon where the sleeping former apprentice of the enemy’s supreme leader lay comatose.

Leia sighed.

“I know Raina well,” Leia repeated. She was good at not letting her doubt seep into her words.

 

***

Raina looked so much like her late sister with her small features and pale skin. Her red hair hung over her left shoulder in a single braid. Leia noted the black robes of mourning that contrasted so harshly with her beaming smile.

The senator encircled her arms around the former princess, pulling her into a tight embrace.  

“My friend, I missed you,” Raina spoke.

“I’m so glad to see you well,” Leia declared, still locked in an embrace with the new Naboo senator.

Raina pulled out of the hug and placed her hands on Leia’s shoulders.

“Word has spread so quickly about the First Order’s fall. I knew nobody should have doubted you. Silly politicians and their cynicism.” Raina rolled her eyes. There was a sadness, however, at the mention of politicians.

“Raina, I’m so sorry about your loss--”

“It’s fine,” Raina cut Leia off, clearly not wanting to broach the subject now.

Leia gave a soft smile and reached up to give Raina’s hand a light squeeze.

“I know this is likely a bad time, but I need to ask you a favor, Senator.”

Leia explained her situation to Raina, requesting food and shelter until she could figure out what to do next.  

Raina was quick to oblige and ordered several officials--all dressed in black robes--to prepare for her guests. Leia thanked the Senator and turned towards the Falcon to begin unloading what was left of The Resistance.

She paused on the ship’s ramp.

“Raina,” Leia called back towards the still smiling senator, “there’s something else.”

 

***

 

Rey leaned beside Finn against the dejarik table as four guards entered the Falcon. Unlike the party that had trailed behind Raina, these guards were dressed in what Rey assumed was customary royal blues and golds. They had a blaster hooked to each of their belts.

The guards lifted Ben’s sleeping body onto a levitating bed that looked like something out of a sick bay. Two of the guards handcuffed each of Ben’s wrists to rails running along the sides of the bed and without a word maneuvered his body off of the Falcon.

Raina had agreed to harbor the former First Order leader, but only for the duration of his sleep. When--and if--he did arise from his restful state, the war criminal would be expected at trial like the rest of the First Order commanders.

Finn’s brow furrowed in outrage as he watched the guards take Ben Solo into Theed’s palace. Rey could sense his anger. The two hadn’t spoken much since Rey had announced that she had taken Kylo Ren aboard the Falcon as if the man had never attempted to murder them both.

Rey looked at him, ready to speak. When Rey looked into Finn’s eyes, his shoulders relaxed, the anger releasing from his body.

“Whatever it is that happened between you two to make you change your mind about him…” Finn shook his head. “Whatever happened...I trust you.”

Rey saw the compassion in his eyes. She drew him into a hug.

“Thank you,” was all she could think to say.

She knew the two had so much to catch up on. She had missed Finn, her first friend. She had worried about him daily and when so few Resistance fighters were identified in Crait’s mine she felt sick. After everything that had happened, she didn’t want to imagine come back to a home without Finn.

Luckily, she saw his face first when the Falcon landed and the relief that crashed through her system knocked the air from her lungs. She had flown to him, taking him into her arms much like she was doing now.

She doesn’t let him go and he doesn’t try to push her away.

 

***

 

Inside Theed’s palace, Leia and Raina were like angry hornets, rambling about frantically, walking hurriedly up and down the palace’s grand corridors and intricate staircases as they rallied the New Republic’s remaining senators into debates and discussions. On the agenda first and foremost was finding and arresting the First Order leaders, especially one General Armitage Hux.

When The Supremacy was destroyed, many of the First Order generals fled in escape pods and ships that had not yet perished in the fire. Tracking their location was near impossible but it was only a matter of time until one of their allies spotted them on some nearby planet. With word that the First Order had been defeated, many of their sympathizers were beginning to abandon the cause. The New Republic’s allies were growing in numbers.

Rebuilding the Senate was another matter entirely that the officials resigned to figure out after the war criminals were captured and their court dates were arranged.

“Well, at least we have one criminal under our custody,” Senator from the Humarine sect, Bana Breemu, noted.

Several senators had gathered via holo in Theed’s throne room to discuss the search and capture of the First Order generals.

“What is to be done with him?” Garm Bel Iblis, the representative from Corellia, asked, his voice bitter and gruff. The senator’s fingers gripped the end of his chair projected in the holo and his thick grey eyebrows furrowed with disgust.

“He will remain here under close guard until he awakes. He will then be tried for crimes against the galaxy,” Raina explained.

“Why must we wait for the prisoner to wake? Surely we have already made our decisions.” Garm’s voice was nonchalant, almost apathetic.

“You know that is a violation of our own laws-” Raina was cut off by Garm’s sudden retort, his voice booming across the throne room.

“Laws? What laws? What have we to lose? What do we have left? How can we be seen as this weak? This foolish? To let the very power of the enemy sleep soundly in our midst!?”

“Senator I--” Leia began to say.

“NO!” Garm roared, “that vile animal is YOUR son and as such you are emotionally compromised. You get no say in this matter, _General_. You are not an elected official. You have no authority here!”

Leia looked blankly into the distance as his words echoed in her ears and stung her at the core. All her life all she had done was serve. The reality began to hit her that with The Resistance dissipating into whatever new government this group was attempting to form, she would have to find new people to serve, a new position. And as much as she hated to admit it, Garm was correct. Leia held no power here.

The remaining senators were silent.

“Nothing can be done until we have the full Senate’s approval,” Bana noted. “But I agree…”

Bana paused, weighing his words. “Kylo Ren is too dangerous to be kept alive.”

Leia’s eyelids shut as she took in a deep breath.

Garm nodded. “Send word. We shall have a vote tomorrow.”

Leia gulped back the emotion that was crawling its way up her throat.

“Do you really want your first decision as a new democracy to be an execution without trial? Do you even understand what that would say?”

The voice that spoke from behind Leia and Raina made Leia’s heart stop and her eyes gloss over in unshed tears.

She turned her body quickly towards the sound to confirm that she had not been imagining things; that her brain, so desperate for some ounce of good news, had not just begun to dream up illusions and tricks.

When she saw him, Leia could no longer withhold her feelings. A tear escaped down the corner of her eye.

Luke Skywalker stood atop Theed’s grand staircase. He looked tired and worn in white robes and a brown cape. His hair was grey and much longer than Leia remembered it.

Luke began to walk slowly into the throne room. Garm’s eyes narrowed at the Jedi.

“Skywalker,” he sneered. “What voice should the son of Darth Vader hold here?”

“You may hold me in contempt for my lineage, Senator, but my compassion for that war criminal _did_ save the galaxy once. And if he lived...even he...even Darth Vader himself would have been allowed a fair trial. You know who doesn’t allow fair trials, Senator?” Luke paused, and lifted an eyebrow at Garm. He waited for his response, although he did not expect one.

When he was sure Garm was not going to offer him a reply, Luke smirked. He didn’t need to reiterate that the lack of fair justice, of law, of order would be leading the New Republic down a path laid once before by the darkest forces of the galaxy.

Bana was silent as he took in Skywalker’s words.

“We will wait until the prisoner awakes,” Bana finally spoke.

The senators gently nodded their heads in agreeance. Garm remained silent. He would not press this matter, however. Not now.

 

***

A week passed slowly in the halls of Theed’s palace. Leia remained vigilant, helping Raina in discussions with the Senate as they attempted to put together the first pieces of the New Republic. Several of the First Order’s top officials were located, many of which had tried in vein to find refuge on he First Order allied planet, Umbara. One of the generals swore that Hux had not made it off of the Supremacy alive. Given his encounter with Rey, they assumed it was likely that he had bled out in his unconscious state.

Luke had approached Rey with the prospect of starting a new Jedi Temple on Naboo. She was eager to begin discussing this idea with him, but she didn’t know exactly where his ambition had come from. She suspected, however, that it had something to do with his frequent visits to Ben’s bedside. She entertained that maybe he was making peace with himself. Rey didn’t see it as appropriate to ask, but each day she could see the sadness in his eyes begin to dissipate and she could see his smile grow a little more genuine, perhaps even a little wider.

Rey had not yet gone upstairs to the small room on the third floor where they kept Ben behind a locked door. She felt strange requesting to see him and she didn’t feel comfortable using the force to undo the lock herself. There was something about wanting to see him that made her feel like she was betraying her friends. Finn had pushed it aside for now, but Poe was still angry that he was being kept alive.

Despite her unease, however, there was that undeniable want to be around him. She still believed it to be irrational. What could she even gain from being around him? He couldn’t speak. She couldn’t look into his eyes and attempt to discern something from that subtle touch of sadness or that glint of something...else...that he had when he looked at her.

She had a need to get inside of his head. It was only right seeing as he had already burrowed so deep inside of hers. All of her secrets...all of her memories...she had locked them up and threw away the keys a long time ago. She had buried them so deep even she was doomed to never find them. But he had. He had unburied ever last one of them and unlocked every door.

“Bastard,” Rey hissed into the darkness of her bedroom.

She had a very difficult time sleeping as of late and her thoughts would eventually drift to him. She wanted to blame the bed for keeping her up. It was far too soft for her taste. The mattress was huge--enough to fit about three of her--and she felt like she may fall right through it to the floor. The gold and blue down comforter felt too heated against her body so she resorted to sleeping in just a wrap around her breasts and her underwear. It also didn’t help that there was a large canopy that covered the bed and she always felt like one night it would smother her in her sleep.

She rolled over on her side, reaching through the darkness to grab the extra pillow beside her head. She expected for her torso to sink pleasurably around the large pillow.

Instead, Rey gasped.

What she grabbed was sturdy and _warm_ . Her fingers gripped what felt like a soft cloth and her ear fell onto something solid, tepid, and... _moving_.

Rey looked up, her hands still gripping the gentle fabric. As she quickly tilted her head upwards, Rey’s tiny nose skimmed across a smooth surface, her lips grazing against it.

It was skin.

Rey released the fabric bunched up in her hand and pushed herself up on her arms. Her eyes had adjusted to the darkness and she could now clearly see what lay underneath her.

Ben Solo was lying on his back, his head turned to the side. Tresses of shiny ebony hair trickled down and across his face. Rey noticed that his hair had been cleaned of the matted blood and sweat.

Ben no longer wore his usual thick black tunic. Instead he had been fitted in a lightweight and loose white long-sleeve shirt. It came to a v below his neck that showed off the tops of his pectoral muscles where Rey watched the slow inhale and exhale of his broad chest. Her gaze lingered for longer than she cared to admit over his exposed skin before being drawn to the contrast between his pouty pink lips and raven black hair, and the white shirt he wore. She had always seen him in so much black...

“Ben?” She whispered, her lips almost touching his ear as she continued to hover over him. She knew she was being foolish. He was still unconscious, after all.

The thought made her somewhat uncomfortable. She didn’t know exactly how she felt, lying over a comatose body, admiring the features of a man who could make no attempt to reject or accept her blatant ogling.

She felt odd imagining him awakening and looking at her with those large chocolate eyes. Would they be sad? Relieved? Or would they be angry? Violent?

Different scenarios flashed through Rey’s head as she stared at him. In some he awoke, startled, his hand quickly flying to Rey’s throat out of instinct. In others, he turned to her with tired eyes, blinking several times as if to clear his vision. He whispered her name, his voice cracking from being so long without use. He would slide his sizable hand up one of her arms and drag his lengthy fingers through the strands of her hair that fell around his face.

And in some--although she would never admit it--he would trail a hand down her spine and put pressure on her bare lower back until her body collapsed against his. She would feel the fabric of his shirt on her naked stomach and the heat of his body against her own. He would let his other hand drag underneath her jaw and cup her cheek as he pulled her into a kiss, his lips devastatingly tender against hers.

Rey rolled away from him, on to her back. She let out a loud, exasperated groan.

“Not helping,” she said to herself.

Her heart was racing and she pushed the thoughts out of her mind before the traitorous tension underneath her underwear could build itself up to a point where it could no longer be ignored.

Rey hopped out of bed and decided that maybe some meditation would clear her mind. She sat down on the floor of the spacious room, the ornate rug agitating her bare legs. She faced purposefully away from the bed. She did not not want to check if he was still lying on her pillows through the force bond. She inhaled deeply, centering herself, and began to lull herself into meditation.

Rey cleared her mind of all thoughts and tried to block out the energies of the palace; of the city. There was so much to take in here...the fear and hope of The Resistance; the anxiety and relief of the civilians as they celebrated their freedom while bearing concern for their new start; and, yes, even her own joys and terrors.

Eventually Rey was left with a welcoming sense of calm that subsided over her body. In the silence of her thoughts she could only hear her breathing.

_Inhale._

_Exhale._

_Inhale._

And then a breath that was not her own; a thin vapor heaving a heavy sigh somewhere in the distance. It was cold and menacing. Shivers ran down Rey’s spine.

Rey attempted to calm herself again but the breathing persisted. It grew louder and louder until it had warped into a whirlwind of randomized, frightening noises . There were hisses and thuds; deep, haunting breaths and unintelligible whispers. And suddenly, there was her name, screamed desperately by a familiar voice somewhere off in the distance, as if from another time, in another world.

She knew that voice...it had shouted at her in the past.

_“No! No! You’re still holding on! Let go!”_

Rey’s eyes flew open.

She immediately turned towards the bed.

Ben was gone.

Rey flung open her closet doors and grabbed a floor length robe of golden lace and blue satin  far too elaborate for her usual taste. When her body was covered she ran out of her room and raced down the long corridor to the wide marble staircase that would lead her to the third floor. She took off up the stairs to the room at the end of the hall.

With the force, Rey unlocked the door. The door flew open with a raucous bang and Rey immediately ran to Ben, his body in the same position she had seen him in on her bed moments earlier.

Rey called his name. Her hands rushed to his face with some idea of foolishly shaking his body awake.

But when she touched his skin--the soft skin of his cheeks grazing her shaking, calloused fingers--the room spun. Somewhere, in some moment in time, in some place in the universe, Rey’s name fell from Ben Solo’s lips in fear, in agony. And then everything went dark.


	3. The Place She Built Inside

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey goes home.

Hey! So from here on out I just want to really stress the "psychological torture" tag. There are a lot of hints to abuse and some explicit moments of abuse in this fic. No explicit moment shows up in this chapter but they will and I in no way want to catch anybody off guard.

Also want to link an album that is a huge inspiration for the fic. It's not an inspiration for the plot necessarily (although I do take lines...the chapter titles are often lyrics from this album. This chapter's title is from the song called "The Estate"). I love it more for the tone/ambiance. The album is called [Unremembered](https://sarahkirklandsnider.com/2013/06/unremembered-2/) by Sarah Kirkland Snider.

* * *

 

She had remembered the bone yards.

She had remembered the collection of remains scavenged alongside droid parts and ship engines, each valueless and cast aside to be swept away by the sandstorms of Jakku.

She remembered as a little girl stumbling upon these high heaps of decay. They gathered in mounds of various sizes on the outskirts of Jakku's graveyard, some challenging the sand dunes for the skyline and others small enough to be instantly swallowed by the sand. They were an echo of the battles fought before her time and of the poor souls who had become just another object to scavenge and to forget.

She remembered looking upon it, eyes wide. Her body shook in fear. Tears had pricked the corner of her eyes and she felt familiar pangs of anger and disgust grow inside of her. They clawed at the pit of her stomach and crept to the edges of her swiftly beating heart.

_They left me to die._

The thought slipped through her consciousness as it so rarely did. And, like always, her heart protested, and her mind fought back like a threatened animal destroying the thought as easily as a raging storm devours a raft.

_No._

_They’ll be back. One day._

But in her dreams she would still see the bones.

Now the mountains of bones before her were mocking her in the moonlight, screaming for all the attention she never gave them when she was younger. They mocked her for all of the times she discarded the possibility from her mind that her parents could be lying within this cold underworld under the hot desert sun. And now they laughed. They laughed cruelly. And they laughed loudly.

_They left me to die._

Rey screamed.

It was violent; untamed. It dug talons into the inside of her throat.

The sand sunk beneath her feet as her knees came crashing down and the force of her agony shifted the sands beneath her. The sand pulled forward like a snake, toppling the towers of bones, the clanking and cracking of the remains drowned out by the vicious sound escaping from Rey’s throat.

The darkness arose. Tears pricked the corner of her eyes and anger and disgust crawled its way once more from the pit of her stomach and crept to the edges of her pulsating heart.

Her tear-stained eyes stared out into the abyss of bones until she found herself staring at a familiar set of eyes. The little girl from Jakku sat on top of one of the toppled bone piles. She wore similar clothes to what Rey wore now: off-white arm guards, gray threadbare pants, and a tunic far too fragile for the abuse she put it through day in and day out. The little girl's eyes were clearer, not as pained as Rey's, yet too hard for her age. She was stone; a vision of grit and vigor.

“Why did you let him lie to you?” She asked. Her voice was firm. It was far too firm for how a child should speak in a wasteland like this. Shouldn’t she be terrified? Shouldn’t she run?

“Who?” Rey responded, her voice barely above a whisper. She searched the little girl’s face for any break in her resolve.

“The man in the mask.” The girl was unmoving as she spoke.

“No.” Tears were streaming down Rey’s face now and she stuttered her words through sobs. “He...he didn’t lie to me. Y-You did.”

“I made you stronger. He only wanted to use you for our power. He’s afraid.” The little girl turned her head to the side, an innocent gesture. “Remember?”

Rey bowed her head. She watched her tears make small indents in the sand. Of course she had remembered when she had entered his mind. She had been drawn to his fear as if it were a mantra, taunting him constantly on loop. But there was another memory that she remembered, a stronger one.

“I saw his future. There was no need for power just...peace.” She saw it again, the vision in blues, greens, and golds. Flowers dangled from vines and swayed faintly as a whisper of a breeze ghosted around him. She could see the light shining across his black hair and the brightness of his smile.

As quickly as the memory had come it was washed out by a leather clad hand reaching out to her, begging for her to join him in a future marked with only death and defiance.

“You already know the truth. He’s never coming back.” The little girl walked across the sand as she spoke. Her voice was flat, emotionless.

She placed her hand on Rey’s shoulder. “Come home, Rey. We’re all waiting for you.”

Rey drew in a deep, shuddering breath. As she held the air within her lungs, Jakku’s winds swept around them, creating a billowing cloud of sand and dust. The specter of her former self vanished with it and Rey was left alone once more in the boneyard.

Rey collapsed onto her side. She curled in on herself, gripping her knees to her chest tightly in some attempt to calm the claws digging into the pit of her stomach and ripping holes in the center of her heart.

The night felt like it was swallowing her as the emotion rolled from her body in violent, furious waves. It was a forceful, shattering thing that made her limbs shake and her spirit splinter. And when it finally subsided, Rey slipped into welcomed blackness.

 

***

 

She could feel the pressure curling around her ribcage first, followed by a similar pressure lying just below her knees. She could sense that one of her arms was swinging limply in the desert air.

Rey’s heavy eyes opened slowly. She could see nothing but sand dunes basked in pale silver light and a clear black sky illuminated by the dim light of the stars. It took her a moment to realize that the dunes were getting closer as she struggled to keep her eyes open.

Rey moved the hand that was slung out to her side and touched the point of pressure winding its way up her ribcage. Her fingers found something warm and tinged with a thin veil of wetness.

She drew her hand away as quickly as her exhausted body would allow and used the rest of her waning strength to jerk her body to the side. Her hand came with her, flying against a white cloth, the feeling of the fabric vaguely familiar around her fingertips.

Rey could feel her senses returning. Her mind was more alert and more aware of her surroundings, especially the position of her body against a giant wall of heat. She noticed that the landscape around her stopped moving and she could feel the once gentle pressure on her back and beneath her knees tighten.

Rey’s eyes--cold and determined--looked up to find the source of the pressure. She gasped, not expecting the anxious and agonized brown eyes that met her steadfast stare.

Rey could feel her face relax into some heady mix of fear, bewilderment, and comfort as she continued to cling to the threads of Ben Solo’s shirt. Neither of them spoke. They remained staring into each other’s eyes long enough that Rey could feel her fingers threaten to break a hole through the fabric and into the skin of his shoulder. He continued to clutch her body to his, one hand underneath her knee, while the other supported her back.

“I can walk,” Rey finally whispered. Her breathy voice sounded too loud as it shattered the silence between them.

The overwhelming despair in his eyes intensified at her words and he gripped Rey tighter against his body. The movement forced her hand to untangle from his shirt and she found her fingers sliding under his hair to lightly grasp the back of his neck. 

There was another moment of silence as they measured each other’s reaction to the lack of space between them. The tips of their noses brushed against the other’s and they could feel their shaky breaths upon the other's face. Rey told herself it was because she was uneasy about the look in his eyes, but she couldn’t help but think of the daydreams she had where she touched her lips to his. It would be too easy; just a simple tilt of her head. But she could not get lost in silly daydreams now.

Rey pulled back. The hand that gripped the back of his neck (more tightly than she had originally intended) wiggled its way between her chest and his in an attempt to push herself away from him. She succeeded somewhat, managing to put enough distance between them so his nose was no longer grazing against hers and she no longer had quite the same urge to find comfort in the heat of his mouth. 

“I can handle myself,” Rey bit at him.

“Not here.”

The sound of his voice--deep and apprehensive--should not have made her heart swell. She pushed the feeling away and scoffed.

“This is... _was_...my home! I survived here for years! Put me down!” Rey made an attempt to squirm out of his grip. The large man did not ease his hold. Instead, he watched her with wide, terrified eyes that caused Rey to steady in his arms once more.

“You don’t remember, do you? Before here, what is the last thing you remember?”

Rey searched his face, looking at him as if he were crazy. She rummaged through her memories and had a difficult time finding anything that placed her inside the boneyard. Rey began to panic, flexing her fingers against his shirt.

And then it all came rushing back.

She saw the same white fabric between her fingers in the darkness of a safe bedroom somewhere on another planet. She saw his body on her pillows. She heard her shallow breathing as she meditated. And she heard the voices screaming like ghosts in the night and the sound of her name being shouted from some place she didn’t know or couldn’t touch.

“Am I dreaming?” Her voice sounded too small as she asked.

Ben didn’t respond. Instead, he bent his forehead towards hers until they touched. Rey leaned into his gesture perhaps on instinct and she was seized once more by a longing to comfort him and to be comforted in return. She wanted to press her hand to his cheek and nuzzle her face into his hair. She wanted to feel him exhale against her, to release some of the fear and anxiety she could feel built up inside of him. But she held herself back. 

“We’re just dreaming.” Rey tried to keep her voice steady. She pushed herself away as far as she could manage so she could see his eyes still wide with terror.

“Rey,” he breathed. The sound of her name falling from his shaking, parted lips sent a pang of emotion through Rey’s heart that was somewhere between happiness and horror.

He had more words to say. She could see them begin to form on the edge of his tongue, but they stopped cold as his body turned suddenly to look off into the distance. It was as if he heard something or sensed something approaching. Rey’s brow furrowed and she looked around, trying to locate what he was responding to.

Ben let his panicked gaze look into the distance for only a brief moment before he placed Rey on her feet.

“Rey, run!” He shouted in a voice no longer trembling and soft. His eyes were wild, burning with an intensity that did nothing to calm Rey’s anxiety.

Rey shook her head. “No. No! This is _my_ dream. Whatever this is, I can just concentrate, right? Make it go away…” Rey’s voice trailed off as Ben placed his hands gently on either side of her face. 

“This isn’t a dream. You need to run," he pleaded. 

“Ben, where are we?”

He seemed to lightly flinch at the sound of his own name. “I don’t have time right now R--” Ben whipped his head around suddenly back to something across the desert that Rey couldn’t sense or hear.

“Ben what are you looking at?” Tears were falling down Rey’s face. “Whatever it is--”

“You don’t hear him?” Ben asked.

“Hear who? Ben. Stop. Just...Just tell me what's going on.”

“I need you to run. I need you to run before he finds you too.” His voice was cracking, his hands beginning to shake against her face.

“Who?” Out of stress and fear, more tears began to trickle down Rey's cheek. She could feel Ben's large thumbs brushing them away as quickly as they could fall.

Ben didn’t answer. He leaned his forehead against hers as he had done a moment before. His thumbs caressed the tops of Rey’s cheekbones in small, soothing circles. Rey wanted to scream. She wasn’t exactly the one who needed the consoling right now given the look in his eyes.

“Please,” was all he said.

She had heard this plea before in the throne room. It didn’t work on her then. She couldn’t accept what he was offering; the plea of a broken man searching for some clarity that she knew she couldn’t offer him. But this was different. He was asking nothing from her now, not really. Whatever it was calling to him beyond the reaches of her own awareness was something he felt he needed to face alone.

Rey nodded, her forehead sliding across his. She grasped his wrist as she did, a reassuring touch she felt compelled to offer him.

“I’ll come back for you, sweetheart,” he whispered before he removed his hands from her face-- the hand holding his wrist falling limp to Rey’s side--and turned to run towards the noise only he could hear. 

At his words, there was a distant memory on the peripheral of her consciousness. It was a voice she had heard before...

Rey pushed aside the thought. She needed to run. Rey pivoted on shaky knees and began to sprint towards the only place she could think to go.

 

***

 

The AT-AT was uninhabited in whatever version of Jakku she was in, if she was even really here at all. She felt like she had stepped back in time. Everything was so well preserved. There was no chance that scavengers wouldn’t have picked apart her home the moment she left with Finn in the Falcon. It was all there; the flight computer that had kept her sane some nights, the makeshift hammock she had sewn together when she couldn’t sleep for a week, the wilting red flower whose beauty didn’t seem to fade even after it had died...and the wall.

Rey ran her hand over one of the marks etched into the side of the AT-AT. It was a bitter reminder of wasted time and squandered hopes.

“Wasted?” A small voice inquired once more.

Rey turned to meet the voice. The little girl from Jakku stared back at her, dark brown eyes, three buns, and a frown upon her face.

“Yes.” Rey assured the girl without a moment of hesitation.

“Is that what he told you?” The little girl asked. She crossed her arms across her chest in defiance.

“Who?”

“The man with the mask.”

“No.” Rey turned around again to face the etchings on the wall.

“Then why did you run back here?  You could have gone with him. But you didn’t. You came home. With me.” The little girl’s hand gripped Rey’s. Her tiny palm was delicate in Rey’s hand.

Unlike the boneyard, Rey did not feel the same emotions forming within her. She felt stronger, more at peace with the truth. However, Rey couldn’t tell if it was because she had truly accepted it or if it was because she had just accepted that this was all in her head.

“You’re not real. I don’t know what you are but you’ve got to be connected with whatever this….thing is,” Rey insisted, waving her hand around. “The dream that’s not a dream...apparently...”

“Then why did you come here?” The little girl persisted.

Rey looked around at the AT-AT.

“I--” she didn’t quite know. It was an impulse maybe, a habit.

Rey reached out again to touch the marks on the wall. Each one burned her fingertips, the memories seeping back all at once. She recalled every empty stomach; every one of Unkar Plutt’s grotesque, unnerving smiles; every sleepless night; every scream from some unfortunate scavenger off in the distance; every glance at the old villager’s withered faces, and every uncomfortable twist of fear in her gut that she received when she thought that that was her fate, that she would die here worthless and alone.

 And then she saw every memory after that. She saw herself escaping with Finn, the Falcon whiskering her off on some unknown journey. She remembered the regret and betrayal of leaving her home. She remembered the horror that gripped her when she realized that she may never find her family. And then she remembered that flurry of visions she had seen on Takodana, the echo of the force, the past, present and future all running together as one.  

_"I’ll come back for you sweetheart.”_

It was a voice she now knew too well. It had reverberated in the cold, snowy forest. Behind the tree sprang a dark, looming figure, saber ignited and ready to attack.

And then Maz’s voice, so calm, _“I see your eyes. You already know the truth. Whomever you’re waiting for on Jakku, they’re never coming back. But...there’s someone who still could.”_

Rey snapped her hand back from the lines upon the wall, the memories subsiding and leaving behind a deep hole in her chest.

She turned around.

The little girl from Jakku was gone.

Relief rushed through her as she leaned against the wall, taking a deep breath before beginning to process her thoughts. She closed her eyes for just one moment and when she opened them, there was fire.

The fire raged outside of the AT-AT as if it had been burning for hours and it extended across the sand as if the sand were made of gasoline.

“Impossible,” Rey whispered, her eyes glued to the wall of fire and smoke. From somewhere outside the AT-AT she heard a cackle that ran along the length of her spine and chilled her bones. She could feel the heat of the flames begin to nip at her flesh and the smoke was building around her, stealing her oxygen.

“Show yourself!” Rey screamed with the remaining breath she had left. The exertion of her lungs caused her to cough violently into the smoke.

Rey couldn’t wait for a response. She ran to the opening of the AT-AT and flattered her body against the exterior of the metal beast. There were sounds everywhere: A girl’s crying, a devil’s cackling, a ghostly whisper tickling her ear.

She found herself trapped against the side of the AT-AT and the smoke was too thick to scream. Her only option was to run through the flames. Would they hurt her? This didn’t seem like reality after all...

The heat was unbearable and it had become impossible to breath. Instinct took over and Rey ran towards the fire, teeth barred, her body bracing for the pain.

 

  
***

 

The room on the third floor of Theed’s palace was bright. The sun had risen and its rays swept through the window and across the carpet where Rey rested. Rey pushed her body up, immediately looking towards the bed.

Ben was there in the same position that she had last seen him in, lying on his back, his face turned to the side. She reached for his hand, but as she did so she sensed another presence coming up the stairs.

Rey ran from the room, closing and locking the door behind her with the force. She disappeared into an extra bedroom across the hall before whoever it was could see that she had been with Ben.

When Rey was safely inside the bedroom, she collapsed against the wall, gripping her knees tightly against her trembling torso.

Rey had had nightmares before on Jakku. She had had nightmares where she was murdered by fellow scavengers and junkers just passing through; where she was left alone in a black room with no way out; where her parents left her to drown in the ocean. But no dream had ever felt this vivid or had deeply disturbed her as much as this one had. There was too much to process; all of the terrors rising up from her subconscious. She couldn’t believe all of things she had heard and had wanted projected in that nightmare.

And that is what it was; a nightmare. She had believed she could find a family, some form of life with Ben Solo, and she had believed it so hard it manifested itself into a wicked illusion. She had created a place where he was tender and gentle and _Ben_ despite his overwhelming anxiety _._ It was a world where he could press her forehead to hers or call her sweetheart or tell her he would be back. He would do whatever he needed to do to put him at peace, and then he would be back for her. But she knew the truth. Nobody was coming back for her. She had to move on, begin a new life, become something more than a child waiting for somebody to save her. 

As much as her own thoughts threatened to leave her in an emotional mess yet again, she couldn't shake the memory of his scream that begged her to think again, to think that maybe it wasn’t a dream. Perhaps Ben had been there, his hands gripping her body, his lips so close to hers....

Rey shook her head.

This was all impossible. She didn’t know much about the force but from what she had sensed of it, the force couldn’t manifest something like _that_. The force bond was something even Kylo had not seen before and those barriers faded so quickly. The bond was barely strong enough to link their conscious minds, let alone play out vivid fantasies in their unconscious brains.

No. This was it. She knew she had to leave Ben Solo and be done with it. He was in a coma. When he awoke, he would be tried for war crimes. What did she expect? A family? A home with him? The dream was like every other one she ever had about her parents where somebody actually cared enough to worry about her and to comfort her despite their own terrors.

She felt furious with herself for even having this delusion of a dream at all. The fist she threw against the wall behind her reverberated around the room with a loud thud. She paused, remembering that there were people on the floor. However, when she sensed nobody around her, she scrambled to her feet and walked across the hallway. She didn't hesitate as she nearly kicked the locked door in with the force.

Her heart shouldn’t clench at the sight of him and she had to take a moment to calm the anger inside of her at her own nonsensical feelings. It only became worse when she imagined his eyes opening to meet hers, his lips forming her name like they had done in her dream...

Rey inhaled sharply. He was Kylo Ren. The man in the mask. There was nothing she could gain from doing this to herself. 

With traitorous, shaky hands, Rey placed her fingers around the sleeping man's palm.

A part of her expected to hear him, to feel him, perhaps even to fall unconscious again. But she felt nothing but his cool skin beneath hers.

Rey exhaled a breath she didn’t realize she was holding. She shook her head as if the movement would rid her of her irrational emotion.

“Bye...Ben,” Rey whispered as she lifted her hand from his and walked out the door.

 

***

“Have you seen Rey?” Luke asked Leia as he ran into her on the second floor hallway on her way to visit her son.  

“No. She’s been quiet lately,” Leia answered, realizing that in the chaos of attempting to put together the New Republic, she had neglected many of her personal relationships.

“I asked her if she wanted to continue her Jedi training. Perhaps find others,” Luke told her.

“Oh? What did she say?”

Luke paused as if he hadn’t actually thought too much into her response before. “She agreed. What her actual feelings are on the matter, I’m not sure. I sense hesitation. But she’s ready.”

Leia put her hand in her brother’s palm and smiled. For the first time in a very long time she had the feeling that perhaps everything truly could be right again.

Soft footsteps could be heard scurrying down the grand staircase to the third floor. Leia didn’t expect Rey to appear and definitely did not expect her to be clothed in a fine lace robe. Leia’s brow creased. It was far from Rey’s usual attire.

“Rey we were just talking about you,” Luke called. The look in his eyes echoed Leia’s concern and she could tell the scene was odd to him too.

Rey’s eyes were stone, her body tense.

“Is everything okay?” Leia asked before Rey could respond to Luke.

“Fine. I just couldn’t sleep. Thought maybe switching rooms would help. There was an odd draft in the room I was staying in,” Rey explained, a smile spreading over her face.

Leia hadn’t known Rey long but she felt as if she knew her long enough to understand what the smile meant. It was a smile she had seen after Han had died, after they had embraced each other and people had said their condolences. It was a smile she wore when she didn’t want to deal with her own woes and wants. Leia took a deep breath.

“Ah,” Luke said. Leia could tell he wasn’t buying the story either or the too-perfect smile plastered across the girl’s face. Her body was still too rigid.

“Well whenever you’re ready, I would like to speak with you about your training, Rey.”

“Of course, Master Skywalker.” Rey flashed that smile again. She walked off without saying goodbye and disappeared into the room where she usually slept.

Luke raised his eyebrows at Leia and Leia smiled at him as he walked away from her.

Yes there was something up indeed.

Leia thought of different ways to talk to Rey about it as she ascended up the staircase to the third floor. She wasn’t her mother and she wasn’t quite sure if that is what she needed, but she did want to be there for the girl.

Leia unlocked the door to her son’s room. The Senate had graciously agreed to give her a key. Every time she opened the door she felt a small ounce of hope burning in her chest that just maybe he would be there gazing out the window, his arm bracing himself against the wall to hold up a body tired from so little use. She shouldn’t be surprised and her heart shouldn’t sink when she always stepped in to find him still lying still on his back.

Leia walked over to the window, opening it slightly to let fresh air drift in from the morning. When she turned again towards her son the sight caused her brow to furrow.

Somebody had been in here. Ben’s hair was thrown back across the pillows where before it had laid across his face. But that wasn’t what made Leia’s heart beat in her chest just a little faster.

There were three clear lines on Ben’s face running from the corner of his shut eye to right below his jaw. Leia delicately touched them, attempting to prove to herself that she was imagining things, but instead gasped at the wetness upon the pads of her fingers.

“Impossible,” Leia breathed. She had an intense urge to say his name, to see if he would open his eyes and look at her. But there was no ripple in the force. There was nothing to suggest that he was awake or that he was any less comatose than the day before. No, Leia could do nothing that would be of any consequence. She could only gaze in awe at her son and the tears across his cheek that had just begun to dry.

  
  
  
  


“

  



	4. Wilderness of Mirrors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey finds she is having a hard time escaping Ben and the nightmares he brings with him, even when she is awake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time jump!! (Kind of...)

Rey had spent the past three weeks sleeping on the couch that lined the wall of her room in order to avoid rolling over in the middle of the night and colliding into Ben’s solid, warm body.

She shouldn’t have been surprised when it first happened. After all, how could her simple goodbye to the sleeping man upstairs control the will of the force? Rey was deep in sleep (a rare occurrence) and in her dreams he came to her. She was in her hut on Ahch-To. Her small body was coiled up alone beside the fire. The heat of the flames warmed her skin and she sighed, running her hand across the floor of the hut.

Rey had no warning of him and did not sense him behind her before she felt his large arm fold across her body. Yet the instinct that usually gripped her--an instinct built up from years of fending for her life in a desert wasteland against thieves and murderers and lonely men looking to touch warm flesh--did not arise. There was no fear or alarm. She relaxed into his touch and let him drag her back gently into his large torso. Their bodies curled together, heat enveloping her from all sides. And then, as if she had known him throughout her whole life and through many lives before, she entangled her fingers between his, a natural reflex. She could feel his nose press against her hair as his head nuzzled into hers.

Peace washed over Rey as she lay in his arms by the fire. Neither of them spoke. It wasn’t until she felt a frightful, uneasy sensation like she was falling helplessly from a large height, that she snapped her eyes open and realized she was on Naboo in a room far too lavish for her taste.

Rey thought the impression of his heated skin against her fingers was simply a memory calling her back to the dream she shamefully wished to return to. It wasn’t until she could feel her body moving slightly up and down from the rise and fall of his chest that she realized he was really beneath her, still unconscious, still trapped in sleep.

Her better judgement over took her and Rey flew back as far as she could, glaring at the body whose head lay perfectly upon her pillows. He was a sleeping prince, dark hair tossed across his face, plush lips parted slightly, sweeping eyelashes lining lavender lids.

Rey shook her head and without a second thought grabbed the pillow unoccupied by her unwanted force companion. She was unable to strip the bed of its duvet--what with his ginormous body weighing it down--and opted for the tiny blanket that lay across the couch on the other side of the room.

Rey should have had the mind to stay sleeping on the couch after that night, but her body had been so tired over the past few weeks.

Luke had resumed her training. The regime was particularly grueling with long mornings spent sparing and learning fighting forms with a newly constructed lightsaber she had crafted with the help of Senator Raina’s armory. She had fashioned the hilt to occupy the chaotic shards of Anakin’s shattered kyber crystal she had picked up from the throne room. To her advantage, the weapon now worked effectively as a staff; something that was far more natural for her to wield than a saber with a single blade.

After weeks of simulated onslaughts by Naboo’s guards in the training field, Rey’s body had felt so frail; so worn. All she ever wanted to do was crash on her large bed and let her body seep into the mattress.

The force thankfully hadn’t materialized Ben's limp body into Rey's room for quite some time and the realization had lulled Rey into a false sense of comfort. But, of course, he did return.

Rey’s day of training in the vast fields outside of Theed had been particularly brutal. For the first time, Rey was surrounded by Raina’s guards without a weapon. Luke had instructed her to only use the force to avoid her enemies. Tackling multiple combatants with only the manipulation of the energy around her was harder than she expected. The effort left her lying motionless in the grass several times, wanting only to soak in the bright rays of the sun and forget that Luke was standing over her screaming for her to get up and try again.

She fell asleep quickly that night, drifting immediately into a dream. She was back on Takodana along the dirt and rocks that lined the lake outside of Maz’s castle. The sun was brilliant, its rays sparkling across the lake like glittering gems. She was perched on a boulder and her toes dipped into the cool water. She laughed as she felt the fish, clad in hues of gold and purple, attempting to nibble on her toes while she pulled them in and out.

Suddenly--like the first time in her dreams back on Ahch-To--she could feel his strong arm wrap around her torso. His other hand brushed aside her chestnut hair that cascaded down her back and threw the length of it over her shoulder. He began to place warm kisses on the back of her exposed neck. Rey leaned into the feeling of his soft lips against her skin and reached behind her to intertwine her fingers through his loose black hair.

Unlike Ahch-To, she turned to face him with the intent of colliding her lips to his. When Rey turned, however, he was no longer there.

In a flash, the world around her had changed. Takodana had grown dark, foreboding, with only a thin sliver of the moon offering any light. All of the warmth he had offered her had disappeared and she felt empty, detached, like she was left without a limb. Rey felt Ben’s name grace the tip of her tongue before she could see him through the feint silver light shining through the trees of Takodana’s forest; the forest where in a memory flickering across the back of Rey’s mind, she once saw a tall dark figure with a burning scarlet saber and a mask of chrome and metal stalking towards her under a canopy of trees and sunlight.

She could only see an outline of him, but she knew without a doubt it was him with his broad shoulders, long legs, and tousled hair. His head was bowed and his hand was braced against a tree, propping his tired body up. He looked so distraught, so depleted, like he had in her nightmare under Jakku’s brilliant moon.

Rey stepped off of the boulder and began to walk towards him. He did not move, a statuesque phantom in the pale moonlight.

“Ben?” Rey whispered, hoping to catch his attention. Did he even know she was there?

His head snapped up, his face now illuminated slightly from the small amount of light streaming through tall tree branches and gathered green leaves.

The sight before Rey froze her in place. She felt like she was back on that fateful day when the menacing figure in black had immobilized her body. But it was not the force that petrified her. No, this time she was rooted to the dirt by the sheer shock and agony that rushed through her at the sight of his face.

The scar-- _her_ scar--that spread from above his eyebrow to the pulse point of his throat looked as if it had been torn open by a sharp knife. Blood trickled from the gaping wound and meandered down his neck and underneath his shirt. His eyes were wide, fearful, just as they had been in her last nightmare. And just like her last nightmare, those sad, horrified eyes seemed to stare at her through time and space as if this was no longer a dream, but a portal to someplace else, someplace she didn’t know or understand.

Rey awoke with a jolt, her lungs gasping for air. She found herself once more with a hand fisted in his white shirt and her face only inches away from his. Their noses brushed together and her mouth was so close to his lips that she could feel the heat of his mouth taunting her to close the last fraction of distance between them.

Like she had done the last time she was caught in this predicament, Rey scrambled off of him, stripping the bed of its pillow, and curled up on the couch.

From that point on, Rey refused to even attempt to sleep on the giant mattress. She would do anything to avoid seeing his face like that again, to see his eyes wild with worry and fear. The couch wasn’t the most cozy thing--designed more for decor than comfort--but it would have to do.

 

***

 

“Rey, I know you’re not sleeping and I am afraid to ask why,” Luke sighed, his voice rough and unamused. It was early in the morning in the large field that Luke and Rey had been using as a training ground for over a month now. Rey continued to stare ahead, away from Luke’s concerned gaze, at a landscape of long vibrant green grass, small flowers of golds, pinks, and blues, and three waterfalls that tumbled over rocky cliffs into a clear blue lake. It took everything she had not to reach for her itchy, tired eyes.

The couch was taking a toll on her sleep and her body. It ached and cracked where it shouldn’t in the corner of her neck, in the small of her back, in the lower part of her hamstrings. All of those years bunched up on a small hammock on Jakku should have prepared Rey for this discomfort. She must have become too accustom to plush mattresses and feather-stuffed duvets.

Luke’s eyes were piercing into Rey’s back, making her more uncomfortable than the twist of her muscles from poor sleep. “Oh, I’m fine Master Skywalker,” Rey assured the Jedi as she finally gave into the pain in her back and twisted her spine in some attempt to release the strain of her muscles. 

Luke raised both of his eyebrows. “I’m old, not dumb, Rey.”

Rey paused her movements and looked up at her teacher with a smile on her face; the smile she wore when she wanted nobody to think that anything was wrong. She wasn’t ready to tell Luke about Ben. She didn’t want to mention that their force bond was still in full swing while he was unconscious. Maker, did she not want to even begin to admit any of her complex emotions towards him. And, most of all, she did not want to discuss that nightmare.

It had been two months since Rey had been caught in the life-like night terror surrounded by a storm of smoke and burning fire. The time had not healed the horror bubbling in the pit of her stomach whenever she thought about it or the rage that boiled up inside of her when she remembered how she felt about it...about _him_.

“Master Skywalker!” The force-sensitive boy named Ansel called from across the training field.

“We’re not done with this conversation,” Luke told Rey as he pointed a long finger at her before turning to aid the small child.

In the time since the galaxy was beginning to rebuild, Luke and Rey had found several force sensitives to train, but not as many as they had hoped. There was the boy, Ansel, a young girl, Evie, two twins from Dathomir, a boy named Temiri from Cantonica who Finn and Rose knew from their short time on the planet, and Jacen, the youngest boy. Temiri was the oldest at age ten, while the rest of the children were between seven and nine years of age. They were all so young, yet so eager to step away from the lives they had lived before. Rey didn’t know all of their stories, but she knew they were no happier than her own.

Standing alone on the far side of the training field, Rey could see Evie skip over to her, leaning down every now and then to pluck one of the small flowers from the grass. Rey smiled one of her genuine smiles; a smile she reserved for only those truly special moments like the smile she had pressed against Finn's neck when she had embraced him once again on Crait.

Ignoring the pain in her lower back, Rey dropped to her knees to be eye level with the small force-sensitive. Rey opened her arms as the little girl toppled into her, winding her tiny limbs around Rey’s neck. Rey winced slightly as Evie put pressure on the knot at the base of her neck. Evie pulled back and placed one of the small blue flowers bunched in her hand behind Rey’s ear.

“Can you teach me that trick today?” Evie chirped while she clasped her hands in front of her and looked at Rey with innocent, wide eyes.

Rey laughed. There was something so simple about these moments with Evie. She had arrived only two weeks ago, but she had immediately become close with Rey. She loved to watch her train with Luke and gaze on in amazement as Rey battled back hordes of enemies or shook the entire ground with just her hand.

Rey cherished the moments she had with the young girl. Focusing on her allowed Rey to drown out her worries and fear, each laid out like a taut thread in her mind. They were the threads that represented the life she never had, the demons she had summoned and let grow and thrive within her own denial and doubt, the pain she couldn’t face, and--although she hated to admit it--there was a special thread reserved for the man lying unconscious on the third floor of a palace on the other side of the city. With Evie, Rey could let those threads snap one by one and drift off, if only for one moment in time.

“And which trick is that, Vi Vi?” Rey asked with a giggle.

“The swoosh!” Evie shouted as she careened her wrist in turbulant, circular motions.

“I don’t know if you’re quite ready for that yet.”

“But you said you would teach me!” Evie crossed her arms, a frown prominently contorting her features. Rey was reminded so much of herself in these moments. Evie had her same defiance and same drive to get ahead, to learn.

“Okay.”

***

Rey had that sick feeling again, the one that bubbled in the pit of her stomach.

Evie’s question was simple and innocent enough, but Rey wasn’t ready for the answer. The child had wanted to know where exactly the technique came from that she was learning. The technique itself was nothing extraordinary; a simple move of intimidation that to a child likely looked whimsical and fun. It was simply a twirl of the lightsaber through her fingers and a brisk movement of the wrist that allowed the saber to turn in two large and swift circles in front of her using only one hand.

At first, Rey had just considered she had picked the movement up after years of fighting with her staff. Surely, it must have been a maneuver she did often to attempt to scare off enemies before they even contemplated striking at her. But as she thought about it, she realized that this maneuver had only come to her once in a red burning room.

She was instantly transported back to The Supremacy. Brilliant orange flames were beginning to burn at the edges of the room as the guard stalked towards her slowly. He held two blades, drawn to kill, waiting for her to pounce. He goaded her on with his slow, tactical approach. Adrenaline stung Rey’s entire body and the urgency to kill ignited through Rey's core like the fire tearing its way through the red on the ship's wall. But it wasn’t just her own urge to brutally demolish the remnant’s of Snoke’s order that consumed her. Rey was not alone in her thoughts or her feelings. She was welded to him as if they were a single body fighting with eight limbs. They fed off of the other, turning each other into blood thirsty wild animals. There was no grace, no beauty in this battle. Their need to protect each other only produced a blizzard of chaos and fury unlike any she had ever experienced.

A feral cry rose from her throat as she prepared herself to battle the guard. She fought with no real thought, only instinct. And in that instinct she drew her weapon, spinning it around her wrist and through her fingers, in some vain effort to terrify the red-clad ghoul. It was something that--in retrospect--she did not recognize as her own, but as something that played off of the fiery, relentless man fending off his own hoard of ferocious warriors fighting to avenge their severed master.

“Rey?”

She looked down at the girl sitting in the grass, watching her intently. Rey was pulled back to the training field, the sounds of the rushing water behind her and boys’ laughter in the distance calming the uneasiness arising in her stomach.

_It was from him. She learned it from him._

“Just practice. You’ll get it eventually.” Rey extinguished her saberstaff and clipped the hilt on her belt.

“But I didn’t even get to try!” Evie protested. The agitated girl put on her best pout.

“You’re not ready to wield a lightsaber, Evie,” Luke scolded as he approached his apprentices. He raised his eyebrow at Rey and looked at her with obvious disapproval.

“Vi Vi, I think maybe you should go see what the twins are up to,” Rey suggested to the girl, flashing her best smile at her. Evie kicked the grass in protest but otherwise ran towards the group of students at the other end of the training field.

“I never wanted kids,” Luke remarked as he watched the young child prance off, “and now I have more than I can handle.”

Rey laughed. “Rose offered her help. It’s only your fault that you refuse it.”

Luke groaned and rolled his eyes. Rey could tell, though, that Luke knew she was right. He did need more help attempting to put together a formal training academy and Rose was much more willing than he was to control rambunctious children.

Luke inhaled a deep breath.

“You’re not going to tell me what’s keeping you up, are you?” Luke was staring at Rey with concern again, the same concern that had shown plainly on his face for weeks. Rey drew in her bottom lip between her teeth and didn’t realize how hard she was chewing on it until she tasted blood on her tongue.

“Nothing’s wrong, Master Skywalker. Everything is just...different. It is taking me longer than I would have expected to adjust to it all.”

Luke did not look convinced but he didn’t press her. Instead he waved his hand, motioning for Rey to follow, as he walked towards the lake.

“What are you doing?” Rey asked when Luke had stopped at the water’s edge.

“ _We_ are meditating,” Luke answered. He sagged to the ground, crossing his legs. From his seated position, he looked up at Rey with an expectant look. Rey stared at him and attempted not to think about the sickening feeling that was once again clawing its way up her core.

 

***

Like sleeping on her bed, meditation was another thing Rey had avoided. She had tried it once 4 weeks ago. She sat cross legged in the field much as she did now. Night had fallen over Naboo and her mind and body were restless. She had awoken in the middle of the night and grasped the pillow beside her. When her fingers wound their way around the royal blue silk, she imagined it was the fabric of Ben’s shirt. She had a yearning beyond her better judgement to feel him, to nuzzle into his broad chest. She wanted so desperately to hear his heartbeat, some assurance that he was alive. Where the desire came from, Rey was unsure. She thought that perhaps it was their bond working in overtime. And then she thought perhaps it was a want for the version of him who she had seen in her dreams; the fictional ghost of the man upstairs who had held her close to him by the fire and had sighed into her hair.

When the need for him became too much, Rey did her best to escape her mind. She considered that meditation was the right move, but she no longer wanted to stay in the room where she had felt him and seen him before.

Outside in the training fields, under the light of the moon, and surrounded by only the sound of water, Rey finally began to feel at peace. She inhaled deeply and registered the breath that filled her lungs. As she exhaled, she could sense everything from the peaceful slumber of civilians on Theed to the flurry of nocturnal insects beneath the ground. She could sense Poe stirring as he thrashed from side to side in a dream. She felt Leia’s worry as she sat awake thinking about the Senate and of the Republic. And she could taste the pure happiness radiating from Finn as he cradled Rose’s sleeping body in his arms.

After a few slow inhales and exhales of breath, Naboo began to blur and Rey began to drift. But as her consciousness slipped further from her and the force began to dance around her in a wave of tranquility, she felt jolted from her transitive state by a feint sensation of burning against her skin. The heat began to build, rolling across her forearms and to the tips of her toes as if her limbs were trees caught in the fury of a wildfire. Rey resisted the urge to scream. Gripping her fists into a ball, she instead attempted to will the burning sensation away with the force.

There was a deep laugh, something menacing in the dark. Defiance shook her core, the warrior in Rey taking control as she sprinted towards the sound in her mind. She pushed the force forward, the fire in her veins flaring, the laugh growing louder and louder.

The darkness in front of her began to dissipate into a thin veil of ghostly mist and the sensations threatened to drive Rey to near madness. But Rey pushed onward until she found herself alone in the cave below Ahch-To, trapped within a wilderness of mirrors.

The fire in her body subsided and she felt immediately like she was enveloped in a giant, icy hand. Shivers ran down her spine as Rey perceived the scene around her.

She saw herself again, repeated dozens and dozens of times, each moving as she did.

“Rey,” a child’s voice cried from somewhere in the fog. She had heard the voice before when she had first descended into the pit. When she was here before, however, she thought it was her own voice; an echo from the past pulling her back into the depths of her own delusions and fantasies of what could have been. This time with Rey’s mind no longer clouded with need and fear urged on by a previous force connection with Kylo, Rey could identity the voice as belonging to a little boy.

“Hello?” She called back. Rey glanced around and saw only the many forms of her following each of her movements. She waited a brief moment. There was only silence. As that silence droned on, Rey considered pulling away from her meditative state and returning to her bed. The adrenaline in her was beginning to die down and fear was creeping its way into her heart.

Rey was about to close her eyes and will herself away from the cave when she saw a movement of a shadow in the corner of her eye. Her vision darted to the dark blur. The many versions of herself had disappeared and she was left alone staring at the small outline of a child behind the opaque mirror.

“Hello?” Rey tried again. She walked slowly toward the figure shifting behind the cracked, murky glass.

“Did he find you?” The phantom behind the mirror asked. The figure had the voice of the little boy who had called her name.

“Did who find me?” Rey inquired, bending down so she could be eye level with the clouded image of the small boy.

“Get out of here! Don’t let him find you!” The boy was suddenly screaming and pounding his hand against the thick glass. Rey went to reach for the scared child but halted her movement when the shock caused by a large hand grabbing her shoulder flooded through her. Rey spun around and looked up just long enough to see familiar, sad brown eyes covered by strands of black hair gazing down at her before she was thrust out of her meditative state and back into the night of Naboo.

Gasping for air, Rey’s body flew forward into the grass. She bit back the urge to collapse onto her side and sob, overwhelmed and frustrated by whatever had just taken place within her mind. How could this be happening even when she was awake? Perhaps it was the force bond screwing with her, forcing her into endless terrors that tested her sanity and courage.

Rey fell to her side but refused to cry. She looked up to the night sky. It was so placid and soothing in contrast to her erratic heartbeat. She was terrified to fall asleep. She was terrified of seeing Ben’s panic stricken eyes another time that screamed at her a warning she didn't even know was real. She felt trapped by a nightmare, or was it a delusion? It could all just be the chaotic, dark thoughts of _his_ mind, imprisoned sleep. She cursed the force, audibly shrieking for it to go away and leave her alone.

“Rey?” A soothing female voice called to her.

Rey ceased her screaming and propped herself up on her elbows so she could see the source of the noise. At the sight of Leia Organa standing with a concerned look on her face before Rey in a blue satin night robe, Rey allowed herself to burst into tears.

Leia collapsed to the grass, pulling the crying girl into her arms. She rubbed consoling circles across Rey’s back as Rey cried into her neck, the two women locked in an awkward embrace.

“I sensed something was wrong.” Leia whispered. The former general stroked Rey’s hair gently in some attempt to calm her. Rey wondered idly if she had ever held a young Ben like this, crying from nightmares, wrapped in his mother’s arms, her fingers running through his thick black hair.

“I don’t know what’s happening,” Rey cried. She buried her face deeper into Leia’s chest. The feelings coursing through her were too overwhelming. Between the fear and panic and helplessness she was confronted with feelings of bliss and happiness so excruciating she wondered if her heart would splinter into a thousand pieces.

Throughout her life, Rey had imagined her mother walking into her AT-AT, her voice soft as she called her child’s name. She would get down on her knees and let a young Rey fly into her arms. They would embrace each other, tears streaming down each of their faces, staining each other’s cheeks and hair. She would whisper she was sorry, that she would never leave her again. She would assure Rey that finally, _finally_ Rey was safe.

In Leia’s arms was all she ever wanted and something that she had gotten too late. Resentment gnawed at her heart as she thought of Ben. Rey thought of how he had this...how he had this and tossed it all away. She cried harder, letting the rage and worry and euphoria and reprieve wrap around her body and smother her.

“Talk to me, Rey, what is going on?” Leia had begun to rock the girl’s body gently from side to side.

Rey steadied her breath and took another moment to choke back sobs so she could speak.

“I see _him_. Always sad and worried and terrified of...of _something_. When I’m awake. When I’m asleep. It’s all so real.”

Leia’s motions stilled as she listened to Rey speak of her son.

“I think it must be the bond,” Rey continued, “it must be something in the force reacting oddly to him being unconscious.” Rey didn’t want to mention the voices or the screaming or the laughing. It all seemed too crazy. “It must be the bond playing tricks. He will wake up and this will be over. But…” Rey began to cry again as the fear swept over her once more.

“Have you told Luke?” Leia asked, her tone only hinting at her concern. If she felt anything else about this situation, she hid it well.

Rey pulled back to look at Leia. The lines of her face and the sympathy in her eyes echoed her tone, however, Rey could see she was attempting to hide a deep pain. Rey shook her head.

“You must let him know.”

“No...please don’t tell him. I don’t...I don’t want him getting involved.”

Rey knew how Luke would react to this. The last time Luke had experienced Ben and Rey's bond, he had brought a hut down upon the two of them. The fury of Luke Skywalker was something Rey did not want to deal with.

“Please don’t tell him,” Rey pleaded, wiping the water from her eyes.

Leia sighed. She was clearly contemplating if she wanted to keep secrets from her brother. She gave Rey a small smile.

“If this happens again, you’ll tell me, right?”

Rey nodded, although she knew that there was no way she would tell Leia about occasionally waking up on top of her comatose son.

“I won’t tell him,” Leia reassured Rey, reaching up to wipe the last of the tears from Rey’s eyes. “I was always the best at keeping secrets.” The former general winked and the two women shared their quiet laughter.

Rey leaned into hug Leia. “Thank you,” she spoke softly as she pressed her tired face into Leia's neck.

 

***

 

Luke was still staring at Rey, his eyebrows raised high once again. He was outwardly skeptical of her hesitation.

Rey pushed back the terror that gripped her core and bent down beside the Jedi in the grass. She crossed her legs, placed her hands on her lap, and straightened her spine. She inhaled one deep, shaky breath.

“Why are you so afraid?” Luke asked. His voice was even as if he were commenting on the lack of rain Naboo had received lately. Rey remained silent. It was either that or lie to Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master.

“Rey, what are you not telling me?” Luke pried after several moments of her silence.

Rey took another deep breath and attempted to shove the fear away. She opted to focus on the sound of the waterfalls behind her and the soft tickle of the grass against her bare forearms. She took in the sunshine upon her face and a small smile formed on her lips as she heard Evie’s innocent laughter coming from the other end of the field.

“I just haven’t done this in quite some time, that’s all.” It wasn’t completely a lie. It had been weeks since Rey last meditated.

Rey severely doubted Luke would accept her vague excuse, but she hoped that at the very least it would buy her time.

In Luke’s silence, Rey stayed focused on the light of the force around her.

“Okay,” Luke grumbled, “now breathe. And reach out.”

Time slowed as Rey inhaled a deep breath and let herself slip into her meditative state, all the while slamming down the fear that threatened to devour her half-truth.

The force surrounded her; shards of calm and peace that assembled themselves around her mind and body. She let herself fade into its embrace, letting it grip her and hold her, warm hands encircling her entire center. She felt the steady rise and fall of her breath and her whole being began to relax.

And on que--as if something had sensed that her defenses had dropped and that she had allowed herself to succumb to the force and to the world around her--Rey felt herself transport to someplace else. Perhaps she was somewhere in her own mind, perhaps she was someplace in the unconscious mind of the dark boy on the third floor. Wherever she was, the warm hands encircling her fell away. The feeling of the sun upon her face dissipated. And Rey was met with only a ghostly cackle echoing from beyond a kingdom of ash and ruin.


End file.
